It’s been a while since I discovered The Key Jar and made one for our dinner table.  If you haven’t heard of this project invented by (who else) a really cool teacher named Erin, check out the link.  It’s a great way to get interesting conversations going with your kids.

Of course, “interesting” can cover a very broad range of conversations.

A couple of months ago we’d sat down to a family dinner, and the Key Jar slip read “Describe your perfect day.”  T-man and Bear went first, detailing days that most kids their age would love. BrightSide’s perfect day didn’t surprise me much either – I believe golf and family time were both in there.

Things didn’t really start going to hell in a hand basket until it was my turn to answer.

RFTM readers might remember learning in this post that we’d put Malcolm in the Middle in the Netflix queue for the kids to enjoy.  What with tween attitudes running rampant and T-man’s occasional tendency to feel oh-so-misunderstood, BrightSide figured a TV show about kids whose parents are helplessly out of touch would be a hit.  Which it was.  It was a hit that sparked dozens of incredibly uncomfortable conversations about off-color topics.

But what does this have to do with that night’s Key Jar topic?

Well, my perfect day looks something like this: I wake up when I feel like it (no shrieking kids, annoying alarms, or puking dogs) and lounge around in my PJs, snuggling with the dogs for a while. Then I’d enjoy a cup of coffee with my book on a sun porch, overlooking the lake and my favorite bird feeder.  I’d write for a while, coming up with brilliant ideas right and left.

In the afternoon I’d be sitting in the shade enjoying a cool breeze while the kids swim.  I’d still be buried in my book, reading away, and then napping when I felt the urge.  No one would have to cook dinner because we’d have an enormous buffet of fruit (T-man’s eyes lit up at that) with cheese & crackers and veggies & dip.

Then the kids would go to bed (without argument), and BrightSide and I could spend time together – watching a movie, reading, or (and this is where things went off the rails) “doing the things we like to do when you’re not around.”  I swear I didn’t mean anything by it; I’d just run out of things to say because, well, we can be kind of boring.

There was a 1/2 second beat and then T-man was all “EWWWWWW, MOM!  EEEWWWWWWW!!!” Bear looked blankly at him and he said, “Malcolm in the Middle??” (because the show’s parents had been all sex-crazed in the episodes we’d watched recently) and then Bear’s all “Oh, man, THANKS FOR THE VISUAL, T-MAN!”

And THAT’S when I just lost it.  I was bent over double, laughing so hard I almost peed myself while poor Bear looked horrified, and then we all just giggled hysterically until it finally died down.

If you’d told me five years ago that my kids would be joking about our sex life at the dinner table I would have called you flat out crazy.  Me?  With my repressed, Catholic, “we don’t talk about any of the real stuff” upbringing?!

I never in a million years saw this one coming.